Some times the voyage is just as good as the destination… While in New Orleans, I wanted to make it a point to pay another visit to Willie Mae’s Scotch House. Since my last visit here in 2001, this place has been through a lot, including being featured in John T Edge’s Fried Chicken book, getting a James Beard American Classics award in 2005, and getting seriously damaged in Katrina later in 2005. Long respected as one of the area’s (and heck, the country’s) best fried chicken places, Willie Mae’s is well off of the normal tourist beat, being up in the 7th Ward on St Ann, and a healthy hike from our hotel…

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A bout of last-minute shopping resulted in another trip to Marylebone High Street, and for lunch we decided to duck over to Baker Street and have a Jewish lunch from Reubens. Reubens is your basic Jewish Deli, not really all that different from it’s counterpart in, say, New York. The biggest difference is in the terminology: in Britain, what we would call “Corned Beef” in the US is called “Salt Beef” over there (the term “Corned Beef” in England implies the pre-cooked nasty stuff in the tins). The difference goes a little deeper than that as well, since the spicing is definitely a bit different as well, with UK salt beef definitely having a lighter spice and more beef flavor than the US counterpart (not unlike the subtle difference between a Montreal “Viande Fumee” and a New York “Pastrami”). Now that you mention it, I feel like I could probably do an entire book comparing the pickled and smoked beef products of several Jewish communities…